Holy cow, where did the week go? Things have been crazy for me at work all week, which leaves little time to update (write stuff at home? why would I do that? 🙂
Anyway, as takaza mentioned, we went to Pittsburgh last weekend. Short version: good trip, useful stuff accomplished, things are on track for July.
Friday – I left my car at work as I took the bus to the train to the bus to the train to the plane. That is to say, I took the shuttle provided by $employer to the Prairie Crossing Metra stop. Dan got on at Buffalo Grove, right by his employer, and we took the train down to O’Hare. Then onto a shuttle bus to the ATS (O’Hare’s train to/from the remote parking lots). Once we were at the airport we grabbed dinner and shuffled through three gate changes and an hour’s delay before we finally boarded the plane. The flight was uneventful and we arrived in Pittsburgh at about 11:30 PM. A short walk through the terminal and we were at the Hyatt Regency Pittsburgh Airport. It being the tenth anniversary of our first date, Dan had thoughtfully called ahead and arranged for a nice nightcap of pastries, cookies, and milk to celebrate. It was a lovely, thoughtful touch.
Saturday – After checking out, we walked over to the Hertz counter in the airport and arranged for our car, a Chevy somethingorother. Impala, maybe? We drove downtown, parking across from the Omni, and walked down to Steel City Diner, where we ran into rigelkitty and xydexx just finishing their breakfast. We ordered breakfast as well and were amused to see that the Steel City Diner staff were still wearing their bright-yellow Anthrocon T-shirts. After we ate it was over to the Westin where we met up with Rigel, Xydexx, Tigerwolf, mongologue, triggur, Talyn, and unclekage. Since several folks had just arrived, we went to the hotel restaurant and chatted over breakfast (and were served by the always-fabulous Randy).
When everyone was done we split into separate vehicles and drove over to the Anthrocon storage locker, where we spent several hours sorting the contents by department and Talyn created an inventory of what was what. He’s taking over logistics for Anthrocon this year and I’m certain he’s going to do a fantastic job. We had finished everything but the Art Show equipment when PeterCat arrived, just in time. We drove back to the Westin and checked into our room, and took a few minutes to freshen up before walking over to the convention center to meet with the salesperson there to walk through some of the space and make some notes for the coming year.
The Pittsburgh Home and Garden Show was going on, and that thing is ginormous! It uses Halls A, B, and C, as well as Halls D and E on the street level. We had to thread through the crowds to see the space, but we were able to identify what needed to go where, and arrived at some great solutions. We also got an interesting walk through the service corridors and saw some interesting areas of the convention center I hadn’t seen before. Anthrocon is using a LOT more of the space there. It’s going to be an interesting year.
After we wrapped up at the convention center, we walked over to Tonic for dinner. The drinks were good, but my ribeye salad was…bizarre. Once again, because it’s Pittsburgh, they put fries on the salad, in this case sweet potato fries. And my “ribeye” looked suspiciously like (cheaper) skirt steak. The flavor was OK, though. After dinner we retired to the bar at The Original Fish Market, drank a toast to Furp and chatted for a few hours. After things broke up, Triggur came by our room and we chatted a bit before heading off to bed.
Sunday – Not too much going on here. I got to go up on the roof of the convention center for the first time since Anthrocon moved to Pittsburgh and it’s an awesome view. The fireworks on July 4th will look particularly impressive from there. The Anthrocon Board members went off to visit the convention’s charity, while we hung out in Triggur’s room for a few hours then the three of us drove to the airport. The flight back was uneventful and we got home pleasantly early, around 5 PM.
I was sad that we had to miss Furp’s funeral last weekend, but we were unfortunately stuck with nonrefundable tickets to Pittsburgh. I’m glad that we were able to call in and share a virtual toast with those who were back in Wisconsin, at least. Speaking of regrets, this weekend is the Dorsai Thing; we had hoped to attend, but lack of funds is a bit of barrier, as is the knife skills class I have on Sunday morning. I look forward to seeing many of our DI friends at Furry Connection North next month, though.
I hope like HDELL you can get Ursula and I up there for fireworks. I’ll pay in expensive liquor if that’s what it takes *grin*
From what I understand, they’re going to be keeping the roof (technically the “North Terrace”) open that night so people can go up there to see the fireworks. I believe there’s a staircase just on the right as you start to cross the Skybridge over Halls A and B fro the Spirit of Pittsburgh Ballroom. That will take you up to the top level, between the hyooge scrolling blue text thingies. Keep walking forward and you’re out on the North Terrace!
We ordered breakfast as well and were amused to see that the Steel City Diner staff were still wearing their bright-yellow Anthrocon T-shirts.
I’m curious as to whether they knew that AC’s board was in town, or if this was just the end of a laundry cycle for them.
Judging by the, um, well-used look of the shirts, I’m thinking they’ve become everyday work uniforms. My guess is that they don’t often supply shirts with the Steel City name on them, so they became a work uniform by default.